


A Cafe and a Conversation

by christopher417



Category: Gemma - Noel Streatfeild
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 15:52:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,188
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/599516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/christopher417/pseuds/christopher417
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gemma and Ann, still young and soaring to ever-greater heights in their careers, meet in London for a chat</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Cafe and a Conversation

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bookchan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bookchan/gifts).



Across a busy London street bustling with traffic and pedestrians crossed a slim figure in a blue trench coat. She was no more remarkable than any others on that street — and was a great deal less remarkable than some — and it is only on close inspection that a few of her fellow-travellers might have recognised the pretty but quite plain face or the limp, mousey-brown hair as being that of Ann Robinson, highly successful recording artist.

They would then likely murmur to themselves, 'Oh, so she does exist' — for Ann's was not a face frequently seen around the fashionable parts of London — or the more dedicated followers of the gossip-pages might think, 'But I thought she was at Oxford! Must be one of those PR beat-ups one hears so much about these days, and really she's just a floozy like all the others.'

Ann would have taken this accusation much more seriously than her observers, but fortunately she was never one to worry much what others thought; and so in ignorance she continued her purposeful march down the street towards the swanky coffee-shop that was her destination.

Here, there was a much clearer furor; the exclamations of 'But that's Gemma Bow!' and 'D'you think she'd give me an autograph?' were discernible from several shops down.  Seeing her cousin deftly juggling three conversations and a waiter, sitting in plain sight in the front courtyard, Ann thought, _Typical Gemma_ , and told herself that she would just have to grin and bear the swarming crowds.

Unlike Ann, Gemma certainly did look the part, her blonde locks joyfully preening, her small features freshly glowing, her legs looming long from under the most fashionable dress. And yet when she spoke to Ann she was the same old Gemma, clearly delighting in the attention but unspoilt by it; 'You'll have a cocktail, too, won't you, Ann dear?'

('Ann!' hissed the whisperers. 'Why yes, that's Ann Robinson! Her cousin, you know.' 'My what a talented family!')

'Just some lemon water for me, thanks,' Ann told the waiter. 'I don't want to upset my throat, you know — we're recording all tomorrow,' she said apologetically.

But nothing could disturb Gemma; she was well and truly in her element. Pretending to ignore her admirers while at the same time giving them the little nods of acknowledgement they so appreciated, she said to Ann, 'Oh yes, of course — you know you really should come up to London for something other than work sometime, really it's awfully fun.'

Ann sighed. Gemma really had never understood just what it meant to be dedicated to academics. 'Well, you know, when I'm not working I'm usually busy studying.'

'Oh, _that_. Surely it can be put off for one weekend. Thank you,' Gemma said to the waiter, who had returned with a martini and the lemon water.

'And how are you going?' Ann asked, changing the topic. 'Still making that film, or are you done now?'

'Oh, no, that wrapped ages ago — it was a very tight schedule, what with me only returning from America just before — but really what I'm doing now is trying to find a nice play to be in.'

'Oh?' asked Ann with interest; she always preferred Gemma's plays to her films.

'Yes, you know, a real juicy part I can sink my teeth into. The problem is all the parts for young women are dreadfully wet — playwrights seem to think all we're good for is clinging onto the leading man’s arm or being rescued by him.'

'Yes,' said Ann seriously, 'I suppose that would be difficult. Still, at least people know you're only acting -- I have to be so careful choosing my songs or people start thinking I’m really ‘Desperate in Love’ or ‘Under Your Spell’. Why, just the other day outside the library some poor boy came up to me and told me he'd be delighted to help end my latest heartbreak! The drivel some of these songs are.'

'Oh, I don't know,' said Gemma. 'Your work is awfully catchy. And some of it is just lovely.'

'I suppose,' said Ann, thinking wistfully of a version of Silent Night she'd recorded on a Christmas album the year before. 'Still, all of this publicity does get tiring. Don't you ever get sick of people — noticing you?'

Gemma, who had of course grown up being taught that people noticing one was the most important thing in the world, laughed heartily. (The onlookers swelled with excitement upon seeing her smile.) 'Oh, Ann, how you did stumble into show biz. Why, so many teen-agers would simply die to get the amount of attention you do! Just look at Lydie.'

'Lydia has all the attention she needs,' said Ann, thinking of her sister's starring role in _The Nutcracker_ and how it was the only subject of conversation for months before or after; but her voice wasn't as stern as her words — she couldn't begrudge Lydie her art, any more than she could begrudge Gemma hers.

'I just wish,' Ann said softly, 'that it didn't have to come with — well — all of this.' She gestured at the crowd around them. 'What do they care what I'm wearing, or drinking, or who I'm dating? Why should anything matter to them but my music?'

Gemma shrugged, finishing her cocktail with a slurp. ‘They see themselves in us — after all we're not much different from them — and they’re curious about our lives. You can hardly blame them for that.’

'Of course not, if that's how they feel,' Ann said, staring down at the lemon floating rather half-heartedly in her glass. 'I just don't understand it.'

Gemma sighed. 'Celebrity really is wasted on you,' she scoffed. She sat back in the sun, its rays shining off her exposed, slim arms. 'If it helps, I'm sure they'll have moved on to the next Bright Young Thing in a few years, and we'll be forgotten. I'll take to working in pantomimes, and you'll be left alone with your studies.'

'Let's hope so,' said Ann, who did not understand the immense indignity of pantomimes.

Gemma shook her head. 'You can't fool me, Ann Robinson. You may be modest, but you're a Robinson through-and-through, and performing is in your blood. You don't really feel as badly as all that.'

'Well, perhaps not,' Ann said, thinking of the wonderful concerts she'd sung, and the holidays spent in London while recording, and of course the money that paid her way through Oxford. 'But it is rather scary, don't you feel, not knowing where one is going? Not even really having any control over it?'

Gemma shrugged. The tumultuous life of show business was native to her, and she vastly preferred it to ordinary life.

'I predict,' she said, 'that in ten year's time, when we meet up again, you will be just as successful and just as well-known — perhaps for your studies as well as your singing — and that you'll be loving every minute of it.'

Ann screwed up her nose. 'Perhaps you're right,' she said, 'but next time, I'm choosing the café. And trust me, it won't be as public as this one.'


End file.
